complete lawn overhaul

siners71

hi all, planning to completely overhaul the garden, new lawn, raised beds, and a gravel path to the bottom of the garden.

History of the lawn: New build 4 years old, 2 years ago, rotivated it and sown grass seeds. only thing that grew was some grass and a mountain of weeds.

I recently decided to re-do the whole thing, and after digging a very small patch, Im nearly sure the whole garden is full of subsoil, and no topsoil... so my plan is to:

1.Hire a mini-digger and take up 6 inches of the subsoil(garden area is 5m by 17 m)
2. bring in 6 inches of screened topsoil(only for new lawn area)
3. lay grass turf

Basically, I am planning to start this over Easter, and Im wondering if I am going about this the right way?

tenandtracer

This book is very useful for this kind of venture. You can get this in Easons, any garden shop.

Maybe add in a layer for drainage if the lawn is waterlogged in winter.
Your plan sounds good!

ocokev

Was going to be at the same crack over Easter but not sure with the rain.
I have a very wet soggy lawn so bought 2nd hand 250ltr PVC water gallon putting it doen a hole and draining the lawn into it then have a garden pump to pump water out in dry periods hence saving when water meter charges come in.

HardyEustace

I'm a complete novice but I'd definitely recommend having a good look though previous posts on this site.

All the top soil in the world won't make a bit of difference if the drainage isn't sorted out properly.

Here's a list of threads I found good. Hope they help
Thread 1
Thread 2 (brilliant)
Thread 3
Thread 4

siners71

I've finally got the job started, however in the end I didnt use a mini digger to take out the subsoil.

I have used roundup on the lawn area, and am still going to take in 4 inches of topsoil. Can I just put the topsoil straight down on the area, or do I need to turn/rotivate the subsoil before I even think of putting the new soil down?

I was thinking of using a scarifier on whats left of the "weeds", so all that stuff would be gone.

What do you think?

Garden 026.jpg

Garden 015.jpg

bbam

If there is much compaction there you might be as well turn it over to improve drainage,

I wouldn't bother about whats remaining of the weeds, just sopt treat and persistant weeds that reappear...

If you raise the level by 4-6 inches will it not cover the bottom of the fencing, this would cause a rot problem and wouldn't be popular with the neighbours

I'd use seed rather than rolls of lawn.... its soo much cheaper

400R

As bbam said if you're able to turn it i would but if not a good rotivating and harrowing will still loosen it up nicely. It does look very compact so at the very least you will need to loosen it up a good bit before putting on topsoil.